Lots of folks in SEC country have been saying it.
It wasn’t 9-3 Alabama that would’ve had an honest chance to go all the way in the College Football Playoff. It wasn’t 9-3 Ole Miss, either.
It was 9-3 South Carolina, which was playing lights-out ball — right up there with Texas and Georgia, for sure — as the regular season ended.
When it takes the field Tuesday against the Gamecocks in the Citrus Bowl (2 p.m., Ch. 7), Illinois, also 9-3, will have its hands more than full. The Gamecocks finished 15th in the playoff rankings (14th AP), to the Illini’s 20th (21st AP), but a double-digit point spread speaks more clearly to the perceived gap between these teams.
Buzz about the Gamecocks grew steadily over their last seven games. The first of those was a 27-25 loss at Alabama, when four turnovers by the visitors — who outgained the Crimson Tide and pushed them around plenty — couldn’t be overcome. After that, nothing but “Ws.” The Gamecocks blew the doors off Oklahoma, Texas A&M and Vanderbilt. They won at playoff-bound Clemson. They went from 3-3 to, “Get a load of us.”
Two of their best players won’t be in uniform at Camping World Stadium. Leading rusher Raheim Sanders and dominant pass rusher Kyle Kenard, who won the Nagurski Trophy as the nation’s top defensive player, have opted out, as did Illinois’ best player, wide receiver Pat Bryant.
But the biggest star on either team will be out there, and that’s Gamecocks quarterback LaNorris Sellers. The SEC freshman of the year is built like a linebacker — he’s 6-3, 242 — but throws and runs so well that many already consider him one of the favorites for next season’s Heisman Trophy. Think of Alabama’s Jalen Milroe — or, heck, Justin Fields — only with even more weight and force behind the shoulder pads.
“I saw one play against Clemson where it was like a cartoon,” Illini safety Miles Scott said. “Four dudes were on top of him, and he just escaped out of it and ran for like 30 years after. So he’s definitely a problem. A lot of the quarterbacks we’ve seen are talented for sure, but LaNorris Sellers is in a different category.”
The Gamecocks also rank 15th in the country in total defense. They’re a complete team and certainly far better than any opponent Illinois has beaten.
On that note: Even though this isn’t a playoff game — and the playoff leaves little oxygen for anything else — a win would be Illinois’ biggest and best in a bowl game in no fewer than 35 years.
The Illini’s bowl record since the 1989 team beat Virginia right here in the Citrus Bowl isn’t much to look at. It includes a Texas Bowl win against five-loss Baylor in 2010 and a Kraft Fight Hunger win a year later over a UCLA squad that actually went into that game with seven losses.
The Tim Beckman years produced one bowl appearance, a 2014 Heart of Dallas loss to Louisiana Tech, a team so dangerous it had lost to Northwestern State and Old Dominion. The Lovie Smith years produced one bowl appearance, too, a 2019 Redbox loss to California, which had gone from September 21 until November 9 without winning a single game.
Bret Bielema’s 2022 Illini finished with eight wins after losing to Mississippi State in the ReliaQuest Bowl. One could argue about whether or not the Illini are better now than they were then, but a 10th victory would end any argument in a loud and permanent way.
“I think to get to 10 wins is a big deal in college football, no matter how it comes about or what plays into it,” Bielema said. “Any time you can get to that mark — I’ve been able to do it [at Wisconsin] as a coach — I think that sets your team apart in college football.”
The 1989 team is in that category. Ranked No. 11 in a clash of two-loss teams against No. 15 Virginia, a co-champion of the ACC, the Illini rolled 31-21 as the monstrously talented Jeff George threw for 321 yards and three touchdowns. It was Illinois’ first postseason win since the 1964 Rose Bowl.
This team has had its fun on this trip. They caught a Magic game. They visited Universal Studios. They inhaled untold pounds of steak at Fogo de Chão. It’s all well deserved.
But there’s a game to play, a very tough one. Will it be a happy New Year’s Eve? That would be something.